[arby]

Has anybody been following the drama between Cedar Fair and Q Investments? Here is the initial background link with a lot of information:

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/q-investments-sends-letter-to-cedar-fair-unitholders-urging-them-to-support-changes-that-enhance-corporate-governance-and-dividend-distributions-111843839.html

In summary, Q Investments out of Texas is the single largest holder of Cedar Fair shares with around 18%. They're not happy with the returns from Cedar Fair so they demanded a special meeting to accomplish two goals.

1) Separate the Chairman of the Board and the CEO position which are both currently being held by Richard Kinzel
2) Reinstate a 'meaningful' distribution to unitholders

Here's Cedar Fair's response to that:

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/cedar-fair-board-of-directors-urges-unitholders-not-to-be-distracted-by-q-investments-ongoing-dissident-campaign-and-numerous-lawsuits-and-vote-against-proposals-at-the-special-meeting-112900369.html

The special meeting happened on 1/11/11 and #1 clearly passed by a large percentage. Q Investments claims that #2 passed but Cedar Fair says it is too close to call.

According to a Press Release from Q Investment, both measures passed.

http://www.thestreet.com/story/10970460/1/q-investments-announces-the-approval-of-meaningful-changes-at-cedar-fair.html

Any thoughts on the topic?

[arby]

Here's the latest:

http://www.sanduskyregister.com/news/2011/jan/22/cfahead012011tjxml

There is too much in there to post it all here. I did find this interesting and even somewhat disturbing:

Cedar Fair itself, meanwhile, may even be targeted for a merger with the rival Six Flags amusement park chain.

I'm not sure where that speculation came from. UPDATE: after some Google searches, I see people have been speculating that over the past year so this is probably just a continuation of that.

[chknwing]

yes merge with the bankrupt Six Flags. Would be better off buying it.

[TrojanCamMan]

Carowinds would not look right with six flags incorporated with it.

Six Flags Carowinds. They would have to rename it, just does not sound right - Six Flags Carolinas, Six Flags over the Carolinas.

[hdmech]

And six flags ceder point!!!! Ewwww

[Blue Moon]

Carowinds would not look right with six flags incorporated with it.

Six Flags Carowinds. They would have to rename it, just does not sound right - Six Flags Carolinas, Six Flags over the Carolinas.

Intimidator and Vortex would also somehow have two different variations of The Flash as their new names too.

[coasterdave]

yes merge with the bankrupt Six Flags. Would be better off buying it.

You do know that Six Flags emerged from bankruptcy almost eight months ago?

[arby]

They announced Tom Harvie as the new Chairman of the Board of Directors effective immediately.
Here's the full press release if anybody is interested.

You do know that Six Flags emerged from bankruptcy almost eight months ago?

To add to that, their stocks have increased nearly 50% since then. They're actually doing quite well looking at their SEC filings.

The problems Cedar Fair is having is one of the drawbacks to being a publicly held company. Investors can end up having too much of a say in the operations of the company. On the flip side, there's not many privately held companies who would be able to come up with the capital to build a ride like the Intimidator so you need public funding.